Testo 176 - Serial initialisation problem

[_Xilinx_]

I am trying to get the Testo 176P1 talking with labview 2011.

I have downloaded the TestoToolbox and also got an update from the German support with a Toolbox2.exe installer.

Anyhow I am unable to get through the initialisation process with the tcddka.dll from Testo (V1.2).

I do have a simple question: What device name do you feed to the Init procedure?

1) the name you can see in devicemanager?  in my case "testo 175-176-2010" --> Exception occured in tcddka: Invalid DeviceName in testo serial init.vi

2) but "testo175-176-2010" gives me --> "Exception occured in tcddka: The instrument is not responding in testo serial init.vi"

3) or the general "testo175-177" results in  "Exception occured in tcddka: The instrument is not responding in testo serial init.vi"

Seems I did set the COM-port correctly!

+ the testo software is able to connect with the device without a problem.

in earliers posts about a Testo Gas detector, I saw characters being added and modifications being made in comsoft.cat file... ?

Any suggestions are welcome!

[_Xilinx_]

These are most likely the possible devicenames which can be connected:

Type	Communication library
testo174	ftd2xx
testo174-2010	ftd2xx
testo175-176-2010	ftd2xx
testo175-177	usbser
testo435-635-735	ftd2xx

My initialisation problem was resolved after unplugging & reconnecting the device!

Attached Vi works without error reporting but I still do not get the pressure value displayed on the screen of the Testo 176...

[ThiCop]

Hello Xilinx,

There could still be errors occuring in your code. (eg. in the top part of the block diagram and in the closing of the reference)

Can you enable automatic error handling and let me know if there are any errors?

[_Xilinx_]

I have gotten some extra information from Testo Germany, according to Peter Thies from Testo,

---

Next issue is: the 176 logger needs to be switched to measure mode so serve the recentval command.

You need comfort software 4 to switch between the operation modes (logger and measure) comfort software 5 is unable to switch.

---

On the website I can only find Comforst Software 5, so I got it mailed from the helpdesk.

After installing and trying to run this cc4.exe I got DLL errors and added the shared Software to my %PATH% variable to resolve.

But now I am stuck with another error from comscore.dll 'LongToDateTimeUtc could not be located'....

Not really easy to get this Testo device working with LabView if you ask me 

[_Xilinx_]

This is the info I got from Nicolas Schütoff from Testo.de

---

do NOT use the init function.

use initserial instead.

pass 0 as 1st parameter

---

Attached vi (also)  works without errors, but I do get the "E_INVALIDARG" out of the StringVal...

I wanted my Pressure Value  (Problem described in previous post.)

[ThiCop]

Hello Xilinx,

I was Out of Office the last days and now I'm back.

I'm seeing that you have had a lot of communication with Testo.

Has there been an update about the Pressure Value reading?

[_Xilinx_]

Hi Thierry, thanks for your concern, I have no luck with this simple pressure reading. 

I will abandon the Testo dll and try with a serial line sniffer so I can see what command is used for fetching my pressure value. I did not find a document from Testo where the serial protocol is described and the helpdesk didn't send me one after asking twice...

[ThiCop]

Hello Xilinx,

Did they provide you with a reason why they didn't want to share this information with you?

[_Xilinx_ · Accepted solution]

I managed to get this "Comfort Software basic" running on a home computer and changed the Operating mode from "Logging" into "Measure", see below image 

This can not be donne with the lateste Version 5 software, you need V4 which I did not find on the website but received from the helpdesk in Germany.

This resolved the problem and now I can acquire data from the device with the earlier attached vi!

[ThiCop]

Are there still parts that require debugging?

If yes, then I will do my best to help you!